Crisis Bargaining and Third-Party Mediation: Bridging the Gap

Abstract

[This study investigates the informal mediations of 100 Israeli and 100 U.S. mediators. It was predicted that Israeli mediators – because of their collectivistic values and Dugri communication style – would be more assertive than their U.S. counterparts. Specifically, the Israelis were expected to put the disputants together more frequently, advise the disputants on how to act, and more often suggest concessions. We also compared the mediations of the Sepharadic Israelis (whose roots lie in Middle Eastern culture) to that of the Ashkenasim (of a European background). The former group was expected to be more assertive because of their collectivism. The data – based upon 200 personal interviews – support the hypothesis for international (Israeli-U.S.) differences but not for those between the Sepharadic and Ashkenasim., The intersection of the study of bargaining and international crisis has proven a fertile area of inquiry that has notably excluded third-party mediation. This research chronicles this omission from the crisis bargaining literature, and seeks to identify whether mediation as a form of international crisis behavior merits inclusion in that literature. In conducting an empirical analysis of third-party mediation in international crisis, this study finds that mediation is in fact a prominent feature of international crisis, with the likelihood of mediation greatly increased in crises featuring a high overall level of violence as well as in crises of a military-security nature. On the basis of these empirical findings, this study concludes that third-party mediation is deserving of more systematic attention by scholars of crisis bargaining, offering suggestions for future inquiry to that end.]